Monday, 5 January 2015

Harvest Monday - chestnut roast

I had a baking day on Saturday. The weather was terrible with heavy rain but I'd had a good session on the plot the day before, making a start on moving a strawberry bed and setting up a stretch of fence to grow peas or something up. So I didn't feel guilty about staying in all day!

I made two loaves - a chestnut roast (left) using chestnuts we'd collected in the autumn (the same recipe as we had for Christmas Day - see recipe below ) and a chick pea loaf using Shaheen at Allotment 2 Kitchen's recipe (right).

To prepare the chestnuts, I sliced them length ways, boiled for 15 minutes, let cool a little bit then peeled. If you let them cool too much they're harder to peel. When slicing the nuts, I check inside each one to look for grubs (I did have to discard a few nuts because of this). Normally you can tell from the outside, as there's a little hole which is a bit of a give away but sometimes they're hard to spot. I'd kept the nuts in the fridge since we collected them, having read somewhere to keep them in plastic bags (with holes for ventilation) and stored in a single layer. Actually, when I still had loads left they weren't in a single layer (due to space) but seemed to keep ok anyway, with lots of holes in the bags. It's the first year I've tried this, so will definitely do it again.

Some herbs picked from the front yard also went in the chestnut roast - Rosemary and sage (I don't have any thyme).

Shaheen's recipe for chickpea loaf was really easy. I include it here as I did use my own onions and mini greeny-red pepper that was the last on my plant I'd brought indoors (above, with my remaining chillis). You can see my remaining squashes in the background too.

I also made a carrot cake but that didn't involve any home grown or foraged ingredients!

Other things picked this week - I found a few more potatoes! I was forking a bed a bit to temporarily move some strawberry plants into it and discovered these, in good condition too.

I picked a couple of the chillis, making a massive soup (with some other ingredients of course!)

And today popped to the plot in my lunch break to pick a bit of chard that went into a curry tonight.

So we got this recipe from Jan's mum, and not sure exactly where she got it from but the scanned page we have says 'inspired by Rose Eliot and Sarah Brown.' My instructions written below are adapted from the recipe, to cut down on washing up!

1 stalk celery, finely chopped

1 tsp olive oil

1 red onion finely chopped (I used a normal onion)

1-2 small carrots, grated or finely chopped

200g mushrooms, finely chopped (or in my case, roughly chopped)

2 garlic cloves, crushed

200g chestnut purée or mashed chestnuts

125g walnuts, finely chopped (we used a mixture, and they were roughly chopped, for varied texture, and laziness)

1-2tbsp fresh herbs finely chopped. Eg Rosemary, parsley, sage, thyme

1tbsp tamari or soy sauce (I found this too salty, as the cheese is salty too, so the second time, used half a spoon)

1 egg

1 cup (100g) grated tasty cheese (We used mature cheddar each time)

black pepper

1. Grease and line a loaf tin

2. Preheat oven to 200 C

3. Heat oil in large pan and fry onion, celery and carrots for about 5 mins. Add mushrooms and garlic and fry another 5 mins.

4. Turn off, and let it cool a bit (as you're about to add the egg and otherwise it will start cooking). Add the remaining ingredients and mix well.

It's tasty Daphne! This particular recipe has quite a few ingredients on top of the chestnuts; onion, celery, garlic, carrots, mushrooms, nuts, egg, cheese, herbs, soy sauce. It would be a pretty soft texture (with a crispy top) without the nuts. Sometimes when making nut roasts / loaves I include quite chunky bits of nut to add a bit of variety of texture. You can put in things like sunflower or pumpkin seeds too.

What a great variety and always nice to find potatoes when you think you are all done! I used to eat nut loaves now and then when I was vegetarian - I might have to try one again soon, these look very tasty.

Thanks Susie. i don't make them that often as they can be quite 'involved' (one recipe I sometimes use needs cooked rice etc so you have to plan ahead and also use lots of different pans too (I hate all the washing up!) but this one wasn't too bad, and Shaheen's chick pea loaf was really simple and quick). It was quite good making two at the same time, plus a carrot cake as there were similar ingredients that I couldkeep using the same bowls for (whisking eggs etc) so saved on washing up :)

Thank you, sweet chestnuts do have a sweet flavour (not to be confused with horse chestnuts/conkers that you can't eat of course!). We gathered these from a wood on the outskirts of Norwich earlier in autumn.

Everyone that grows potatoes seems to discover some rogue tubers long after the season is done - can't wait for next year when I finally grow some - I love garden surprises...well, the good kind anyhow!

Like Sue I had only ever roasted chestnuts before, but this Christmas I thought I would try the boiling method for some chestnut stuffing I was making. I found that the outer shell was easy enough to peel, but the inner skin was much more difficult to get off. I had to let most of them dry out in the oven for a bit until that inner skin became crispy so that it would more easily flake off.

Yay, potatoes are relatively simple so hope you have a good first year with them. You get blight on your toms don't you? So maybe an early variety that is ready to harvest before blight strikes might be a good choice?Ha ha, yes I've had some bad surprises too in the past (like digging up something unidentifiable and smelly that a fox had buried, possibly some raw fish, urgh)Yep I've had problems peeling boiled chestnuts before too, but the last two boilings have been easier to peel for some reason, maybe because I'd kept them in the fridge beforehand this time? Don't know why really.

Ooooh I love a good meat / nut / whatever roast! And I love the fact you are still picking chard - this is a definite for me when I get going with my tiny garden - went out on Sunday to pick up something to put in it - peat-free compost, manure etc etc and some early seed potatoes for my spud bags.Also bought a proper maselin pan for my marmalade - I've always used a huge cast iron pan which isn't easy to lift! I shall be re-reading your posts with jam in them too.......

Chard's definitely a good crop to try Lynne. I keep meaning to cover some over with plastic to protect it a bit from the weather (I have mesh over it to keep the pigeons off though). Our few sporadic sunny days are keeping it it reasonable condition so far.Glad to hear you're using peat-free compost :) My friends grow potatoes in spud bags in their front garden with good results. Ooh a maselin pan is exciting. I'm not the best jam-maker but you might be able to learn something from my mistakes!

Hello Lou; I'm visiting as a result of the comment you left on my blog, concerning blogs and blogging...I note that you say you have problems with getting good photos. I was like that too when I first started, but I have gradually learned a few successful techniques. It may not be appropriate for me to advise you what to do, but I'm willing to assist if you think I could help....

Hi Mark, thank you that's very kind. My main problem with taking photos on my camera is that our laptop is quite old and slow now and takes ages to initially crank up, sometimes I have to shut it down and restart before I've even got anywhere, and then to download photos incredibly slowly is just too painful a process! As I don't have a smartphone, the only way I can get photos easily on to the blog is to take them on the iPad, which is where I write the blog on Blogsy. The iPad takes ok photos in natural light but is pretty poor inside after dark, which means most of my winter pics are a bit rubbish (as it's usually dark after I've got home from work etc.) . I think I need to get better technology :/

I am so happy that you liked the recipe Lou. so agree, very easy to make. The Zaatar is not necessary, it just gives it a different flavour - you can def. vary and adapt this recipe. Most excellent that you used frozen bread, i think thats a good idea. I have heard people doing that, but to be honest I have not yet. I hope to make this Chickpea loaf again, come February now as I am following the Veganuary challenge for January. I would so love to make your Chestnut Roast, please do share the recipe with me. Admiring you Harvest Monday - the chillis of course, I do hope to get back into growing the way I used to when I first set up my blog, lots has happened in between, but I hope to begin once again with fresh energy.

Hi Shaheen, I've added the chestnut roast recipe to the bottom of the blogpost, it's pretty straightforward, just lots of chopping.Yes, soon you can start sowing seeds :) I keep meaning to sow some peas in the lean-to for peashoots but I won't start properly until feb, with tomatoes inside.

I made it over the weekend and it was really yummy. I am blogging about it tonight, and will link to the original recipe as I won't be re-typing it PS It is one I will make again for sure. Thank you so much for sharing.

About Rainbow Chard

It was Easter 07 when we got our allotment - all writhing with brambles and couch grass a-plenty. From it's extremely overgrown state (it was vacant for at least five years) we've steadily tamed the wilderness into something more manageable. As we didn't capture the mess that it was in at the beginning, this is a way of recording what we've been up to recently, so we don't make the same mistakes! Lou does most of the work, with occasional help from Jan.